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 | Written by Jim Sarruda on Tuesday, 15 April 2008
Category:Sheldon on Sports
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Okay, before you all get mad at me.
I want to start out by saying I like hockey. I enjoy watching the NHL casually. I have fun playing floor hockey. When I get the opportunity, I love skating and playing roller hockey. I subscribe to the opinion that the NHL has the most to gain from High Definition Television, when compared to any other professional sport. I love Sydney Crosby. I love the passion and intensity he brings to the game. I love the somewhat recent NHL rule changes. Rejecting the concept of a “tie” was a great idea. Ties and stale mates are frustrating and weaksauce. If you want to play for hours and come to no decision, that’s fine, that’s what soccer is for.
However, compliments aside, the NHL Playoffs are irrelevant. The Canadians can’t deny it! It’s true! The NHL has the most worthless regular season and playoff system compared to any other sport. By the time the Stanley Cup is hoisted, the hockey world should be in 100% agreement that the player under it is wearing the jersey representing the best NHL team in the world.
 He looks like a homeless guy
The fact that you can make a solid argument for another team is a complete abomination.
The National Hockey League regular season consists of eighty-two games, which are allegedly used to determine the sixteen best teams in the league that year. When the eight best teams from each conference are locked, professional hockey uses the traditional playoff system to crown the world champion.
The premise of the NHL setup is fine. The problem lies within the ranking system used to determine the eight best teams of each conference.
Each conference, as most of you know, is divided into three divisions. Logically, the three division winners make the playoffs, along with five wild cards. The system is very similar to the National Basketball Association.
So if professional basketball has the same system, then why am I singling out hockey?
Hockey uses a similar system, but it is not the same system. The NBA ranks its teams according to a win/loss record like professional baseball and football, whereas hockey does not. The NHL keeps its team standings on a point basis: where two points are awarded for each win, and subsequently one point for each overtime loss. The points are then tallied at the end of the season, determining the division winners and wild cards.
 Rewarding losers must be Canadian
Why award the losing team a point? I’m sorry but competition is defined by winners and losers. There is no second best and there is no tough loss. For example, I am a huge fan of college basketball and all season long I complain that the March tournament selection committee doesn’t put enough emphasis on close losses to high caliber teams. However, hockey has made me appreciate why the stubborn selection committee doesn’t care if you lost in your conference tournament by thirty or you lost because someone luckily drained a jumper from behind the backboard at the buzzer. Winning is all that matters, a respectable concept.
In professional hockey however, winning is not all that matters. In fact, winning might not impact your playoff seeding!
Let us take a look at last year’s NHL Playoffs, because this year isn’t yet in the books.
Team A (Let’s call them Nashville) has 51 wins and 8 overtime (good) losses.
Team B (Let’s call them San Jose ) also has 51 wins, but only 5 good losses.
Team C (Let’s call them Dallas) has 50 wins, but 7 good losses.
Team D (Let’s call them Detroit) has 50 wins, but 13 good losses.
After multiplying the wins by two and adding on the “good losses,” we determine the point total:
Nashville: 110
San Jose: 107
Dallas: 107
Detroit: 113
San Jose has more wins then Dallas, yet they are tied in the standings! In fact, if Dallas had one more additional “good loss,” then Dallas could actually be ranked ahead of San Jose in the playoffs.
Detroit has less wins then both San Jose and Nashville, yet they are awarded home ice throughout the playoffs because they have more “good losses.”
 First Loser
Furthermore, Nashville, San Jose, Dallas and Detroit were the four winning-est teams in the Western Conference last year and behind only Buffalo in the entire NHL. To put this in perspective, this year there was only one team with 50 or more wins in the NHL. It should be safe to say that these four teams were powerhouses and were the first four seeds into the playoffs.
However, the idiotic NHL Playoff system requires that the division winners be the first three seeds into the conference playoffs.
What this means is the division winners, team E and team F, claim the number two and three spots in the Western Conference playoffs. Nashville is second to Detroit in that division, so that makes the poor Predators automatically the #4 seed. Surprisingly, despite winning 50 or more games each, neither Dallas nor San Jose actually won their respective divisions!
Team E (Let’s call them Vancouver) had 49 wins and 7 “good losses.”
Team F (Let’s call them Anaheim) had 48 wins and 14 “good losses.”
Vancouver: 105
Anaheim: 110
Let me get this straight. Nashville has 51 wins and Anaheim has 48 wins, they both have the same number of points, and Anaheim gets the 2 spot while Nashville gets the . . . . . FOUR SPOT?
I swear a monkey with a crown could do a better job organizing a playoff system.
Then there is the other division winner, Vancouver, who has the least amount of points of all of the mentioned teams, claiming the third spot and home ice in the first round of the playoffs.
Did I forget to mention that Anaheim, San Jose, and Dallas were all in the same division?
I think it is time to summarize.
Claiming the first overall spot in the Western Conference playoffs, is the Detroit Red Wings, who have the most points and 50 wins. Fair enough.
Claiming the second spot is the Anaheim Mighty Ducks, who have the fewest wins of every team in the Western Conference playoffs except Calgary.
Claiming the third spot is the Vancouver Canucks, who have the fewest points of every team in the Western Conference playoffs except Minnesota and Calgary.
Claiming spots 4, 5, and 6, were three of the five most winning-est teams in the NHL in the 2007 playoffs.
The hilarious part is because Nashville and San Jose claimed spots four and five, they had to play each other in the first round! The hockey playoffs are organized in such a way that two of the three most winning-est teams in the league that year had to play each other in the first round.
 Great Scheduling
How could anyone tell me that the regular season in hockey is relevant, if the two most victorious teams in the Western Conference play each other in the first round as the four and five seed? Barring an upset, the winner would then play a road series against a team with the second lowest point total in the Western Conference playoffs?
Are you kidding me?
And do you know who won the Stanley Cup that year? The Anaheim Mighty Ducks, who undeservedly claimed a two seed in the Western Conference playoffs and enjoyed home ice for two of their three playoff series.
How could we ever know if Anaheim was the best team in hockey last year? The system eliminated one of the best teams in the Western Conference in the first round!
Imagine if Dallas played Green Bay in the first round of the 2007 NFL playoffs. Since the system isn’t retarded, the New York Giants had to beat both of those teams in the playoffs, proving they were the best team in the NFC last year.
Imagine if Detroit and Cleveland played in the first round of the NBA Playoffs. Since the system isn’t moronic, the plan allowed for the two best teams in the conference to have the chance to compete in the conference championship.
How does eliminating the best competition in the first round help determine who is truly the best team in the league? Baseball only lets four teams into the playoffs, and they play 162 games to make sure they get those four teams right!
So is the world in 100% agreement that the Mighty Ducks were the best hockey team in the world last year?
Well if we are, then we believe that winning regular season games and home ice are both irrelevant in the NHL playoffs.
If we are not, then the NHL playoffs are irrelevant to the regular season.
I’ll take it one step further and say the NHL is irrelevant. Maybe that’s why General Electric makes more money selling refrigerators then from airing the Stanley Cup Finals on NBC.
 Rating was 0.62 last year
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By:Jim Sarruda
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